Date: Wed, 17 Jan 2007 09:56:50 +0100 From: A.K. Subject: The Merchant of Venice 17/29 (historical) ---------------------------- THE MERCHANT OF VENICE Or The Twenty-Four Nights of Lorenzo and Poletto by Andrej Koymasky (C) 2006 written the 17th of June, 1991 translated by the author English text kindly revised by John ----------------------------- USUAL DISCLAIMER "THE MERCHANT OF VENICE" is a gay story, with some parts containing graphic scenes of sex between males. So, if in your land, religion, family, opinion and so on this is not good for you, it will be better not to read this story. But if you really want, or because YOU don't care, or because you think you really want to read it, please be my welcomed guest. ----------------------------- CHAPTER 17 THIRTEENTH NIGHT Lorenzo Takes a Wife... Lorenzo entered his room and found Poletto asleep on his bed. Possibly the boy had not been able to wait awake for him until so late. Already seized by a subtle desire, the man undressed and slipped under the covers, near the boy.. The boy woke up and worriedly said, "Forgive me, master, I fell asleep..." "But you are now awake, my beautiful boy. I want you so much, do you know?" Poletto laid his face on Lorenzo's arm, coiling up against him, satisfied. The contact of their naked bodies aroused both of them at once. "So then, dear master, yesterday evening you didn't resume telling me your story, we were both burning with too much desire. But do you feel like telling me, tonight?" The man caressed the sweet naked body of the boy, under the covers, and asked him, "Before or after?" "Before, before, dear master. So, after, we can do what you are going to narrate." Lorenzo smiled, "All right, little rascal. But then, take that hand away from there or I will take you now! So, let see. I'll tell you about... Where were we the night before I had to leave?" "You succeeded in making love with all the seven brothers and then Riza asked you to leave Isfàn." "Yes, right. Well... I was then twenty-six and with my merchandise, and with three more slaves I had bought, after leaving Isfàn I joined Abdullah Rameshi's caravan. He was a Mohameddan born on the banks of Indo river, who I had met in Isfàn, and who was going to Kabul. We were loaded with goods and we were well armed, because we always feared the attack of marauders along the way. The marauders were terrible, you know, Poletto? They appeared all of a sudden and swooped upon travelers, with their fast horses, when you least expected it. They surrounded you with their very sharp scimitars and literally cut you in pieces, then seized all your belongings, merchandise, slaves and animals, and went away leaving you there, dead. At times they spared young women, boys and children, but not out of mercy - only because they could keep them as slaves and then sell them. The caravan was proceeding slowly, winding along the road for a long stretch. Abdullah was riding near me and telling me one of his never ending stories. I didn't know how much truth there was and how much they were embroidered fantasy. For sure the basic of the story must have been real, it really happened, but each time he narrated it, he embellished it with a thousand invented and added details. Anyway the merchant was a good story teller, as almost all the merchants are, and I was listening to him willingly, also because in that way the time of the journey was passing more agreably. When we reached Kabul, at first I decided to stop there. My commerce was flourishing and my Ibrahim had become to me more than a slave. Beside rejoicing my nights with his unchanged impetuosity, I had put him in charge of the other two slaves I had bought and he became somewhat of a counsellor and factotum." "Did you also make love with the other slaves, master?" "At times, but I usually preferred Ibrahim. You know, his personality was a little like yours and I liked him very much, not only to make love with him but also just to spend time with him." "So, then... you like me also, master?" "Do you doubt it? You know it, don't you? Well, as I was saying, I stopped for a while in Kabul, but then I decided to continue my journey towards the East." "Didn't you have a beautiful amorous adventure in Kabul to tell me?" "No, nothing special. People there are mainly mountain folk, somewhat uncouth people, closed, and very wary of strangers. It was not easy to become their friends. Once when I was trying to do it with a really handsome boy who had accepted my court, at the most intimate moment his brothers came and thrashed both of us. Therefore, having heard that Abdullah decided to go back to India, I joined his caravan again and left Kabul. The road was winding in more and more narrow and steep hairpin bends, climbing the mountain, cloaked with woods. When we reached a spot where the valley was opening a little, the caravan made a stop. "This is a good place where to pass the night." Rameshi said. "But we have at least two more hours of sun." I objected. "Yes, but at sunset time we would be in a point where there is not enough space to gather in a circle and defend ourselves. This is the best point, all long this stretch of road. Here we can light fires, we have water, and if somebody tries to attack us, he would have to fight uphill, and therefore disadvantaged. The night is very cold in this valley. Find a well sheltered corner and, above all, keep your favorite slave very close to you, tonight." Rameshi said, laughing. I nodded with a smile. Then I called Ibrahim and told him, together with the other two slaves, to perpare a well sheltered spot for the night. As always, my slaves made a wide square, more or less like this bed, putting all the merchandise on three sides, the animals outside, and inside our covers. Then, on the open side, facing the center of the circle of the caravan, they started a fire and prepared our food. All the camp was feverish with activity where Rameshi was making sure everything was done properly. From the many fires soon arose inviting smells. Sun had just set when we started to eat, all together, sharing, as it was customary, what each group had cooked. Then somebody took out the music instruments and started to play and sing. After a while one of Rameshi's slaves, a really beautiful boy, started to dance and soon others joined him. The youth was dancing in a very sensual way and I noticed that many were following his movement, their eyes filled with lust. Also one of my slaves seemed fascinated by that youth and I amusedly thought that at that moment he would have a fantastic hard-on. Later, feeling tired, I stood up and, said good night to Rameshi, made a sign to Ibrahim with my head to follow me. The boy came immediately, his eyes bright, as he knew why I was calling him. As we reached our covers, an agreeable scene met our eyes - one of my slaves was sitting on the ground, his legs spread, his tunic raised at the waist, his breeches open, while the other, lying near him with his head on his thigh, was sucking his large turgid tool with ardour. I held Ibrahim back with my hand and for a while we looked at them, while they continued, unaware. After a while, the one sitting on the ground saw me and emitted a chocked groan, pushing his companion away. "No, don't worry, go on, I like looking at you. Go on, you, resume sucking him. And undress, it would be even better..." "But it is cold..." Ibrahim objected. "No, we will join them and we will warm each other all together." I answered starting to undress. So we started a real orgy, and because the other three slaves I had bought in Kabul soon arrived, and they too joined us so that soon it was all a tangle of members and aroused bodies. Excitement was communicating from one to another and desire was increasing. I was surrounded by bodies, lying on bodies, covered by bodies. So many hands were touching, groping, caressing me, so many mouths were searching, sucking, kissing me everywere. I touched muscled chests and their dark and turgid nipples, touched strong and hairy legs or smooth and tender ones, hollow and tense tummies, my hands explored thick bushes of dark hairs, until seizing hard rods of various sizes, but all palpitating, groped soft or firm asses, met wet and warm mouths... At certain point, while I was taking Ibrahim who was under me on his back, his legs folded on his chest, just at our side one of my slaves was taking his mate in exactly the same position. It was a little like looking at ourselves in a mirror and I found it really exciting. Ibrahim turned his head and started to lick the ear of the one lying at his side. The boy turned his head and they kissed, while their hands lowered to masturbate each other, both shaking under the strokes they were receiving in their exposed asses. On the other side of us, almost at contact with us as there was little space, another of my slaves was on all fours and was taking a rod in his ass and another in his mouth from the other two slaves. But soon all the positions changed. I started to fuck the fucker who was at my right while Ibrahim slipped under the one who was on all fours and started a good sixty-nine. Then I felt the hard pole of one of my slaves rummage between my buttocks and I willingly accepted that penetration. When another of the boys stood up, I pulled him near me and started to suck his tool with gusto... We continued so until, one afer the other, we reached the orgasm. Then, gathering all of them very close to me and covering us with the blankets, we finally went to sleep. At the first light of the sun I woke up feeling a mouth slipping up and down on my hard tool. It was the youngest of my slaves, a sixteen-years-old Nubian. I looked around - all the others had already left and only we two were there. I let the boy carry out what he had started, then we also got up. We went to wash at the nearby stream, loaded all my merchadise on our animals again and took our place in the caravan. Soon Rameshi came to ride at my side. "Lorenzo, did you hear last night what a concert of moans and groans? I fucked the boy who started the dance - he has a golden ass, I can assure you!" "No, I heard nothing, I was too busy taking care of all my slaves..." "They gave you problems?" "No, they gave me pleasure!" "All of them?" "Yes, all together. I never had before the occasion to do it with all six of them at once - it has been very agreable and amusing." Rameshi burst in laughter, "And it was I who presumed to make you envious! Well, mine was just one, but he has been great, believe me. Well, not really like one of my women, anyway." He immediately added, almost to set things right. "A skilled man beats any woman." I said in a retort. "Yes, I know that you like men better. Each to his taste. The important thing is not to have an empty bed, right?" We continued the journey. A few days later, we were going down the mountains towards Peshawar, being already in Indian territory, when Rameshi stood up on his stirrups and rode ahead of the caravan. His sudden departure surprised me, so I followed him at a gallop. When I reached him, he was on the border of the road and was scanning down toward the valley. "What's up, Rameshi?" "I don't know... several horses at a gallop. They are chasing after somebody." "Robbers?" I asked, alarmed. "No, that would be odd. They are coming towards us. It will be better to be prepared, anyway." "Yes, I can see them now too. The fugitive has enough lead. Do you think he would manage to escape his chasers?" "What's that, are you supporting him? He could be a criminal..." "Or possibly a persecuted person..." "Anyway let's be ready. What he is, is not our concern." The caravan stopped and all the armed men arranged themselves on the front towards the valley, waiting. I don't know what seized me, but on impulse I spurred my horse towards the fugitive. I barely heard Rameshi voice calling me, the yelling of the caravan men, and I already was far away. In a few minutes I was nearer the fugitive and stopped to look. He was coming at gallop towards me and he seemed not yet aware of my presence. I could not yet to see him clearly. Suddenly his horse pranced, I clearly heard his scared neigh, and the rider was cast onto the ground and laid there, still. I again spurred my horse and rapidly reached the fallen person. From that point his persecutors were not yet visible. I got off the horse and bent over him. He was like a bundle, unmoving, lying prone on the road. I took his shoulder and turned him - he was a boy, about twenty years old, with delicate and refined features, of an incredible beauty. And he had lost his senses. Looking at him and feeling at once a strong attraction was one only thing. Whoever he was, I felt I had to rescue him. I could possibly later repent that, but at that moment I didn't care at all. My brain was working incredibly fast. I lashed my horse that immediately ran uphill going back alone towards the caravan. The boy's horse was no more in view, possibly had fled up the slopes of the mountain, amongst the thickets of trees. I seized the boy loading him on my back like a sack and plunged towards a nearby thicket of bushes, hiding in the middle of it. The ground in that point was steeply sloping down and I had trouble not to fall down. But when I turned to look towards the road I was aware that it was impossible to see us from there. After a short while I heard the persecutors passing fast on their horses, beyond the point where the boy had fallen. I penetrated a little more into that kind of wild gorge, always with the dead weight of the boy on my shoulders. Meanwhile Rameshi saw my horse coming back alone. He took it and entrusted it to Ibrahim. Then the persecutors arrived and stopped in front of the armed men of the caravan. "Let us pass!" one of them enjoined. "Who are you and what do you want from us?" Rameshi asked. "We are men of Rawalpindi Raja and we are chasing a fugitive." "Ah, the rider that passed a while ago? Who was he and what did he do?" "He passed by here? Why didn't you stop him?" "What do you want me to know of your matters? He was alone and apparently unarmed, he was not a problem for us, nor a danger, so we let him go." "Then let us pass, we have to catch him!" "But who was he, and what did he?" Rameshi again asked. "It's not your matter. Let us pass or we'll have to open our way with our weapons." "We have more weapons than you and we are more than you... but you can pass, I certainly don't want to thwart the Rawalpindi Raja." The soldiers started their chase again. As they had passed all the caravan, Rameshi gave order to resume the journey. Ibrahim, worried, asked him, "But where is my master? Why did his horse come back alone? What happened to him? "I don't know. Let's go down looking out well. We can find him dismounted, he might have fallen from his horse." Meanwhile I had put on the ground my burden and was checking he didn't have broken bones. It didn't seem so. I was carefully examining him when he opened his eyes and looked at me worried, almost scared. He said me something in a language I didn't know. So, in Arabic, I told him, "Don't be afraid, I'm not your enemy. Who are you, why were you on the run, from whom or what?" "Where are they?" the boy then asked in a rather understandable Arabic. "Who are you talking about?" "They... the ones who are chasing me." "They went up the mountain, they aren't here anymore." "What happened?" "Your horse shied and threw you out of the saddle. You lost your senses. I saw that you were persecuted so I hid you here in the woods. They didn't see you and are continuing to chase after you up the mountain road." "Who are you? Why did you hide me?" "I am a merchant from Venice. I hid you because you were persecuted." "Venis? Where is it, in Mesopotamia?" "No, very much farther away. But who are you? Why did they chase you? What did you do? Who are those who were chasing you?" "It is a very long story... They mustn't find me... I did nothing bad, I swear." "What's your name?" "Hammira Gosvamin. And yours, foreigner?" "Lorenzo Zorzi. Will you tell me why they chased you?" Then he narrated to me he was the elder son of Chacval Raja. He told me he was the heir apparent to the throne but that he absolutely didn't want to take his father's place. Thus, his father had committed him to Rawalpindi Raja who had to persuade him. The Rawalpindi Raja was a distant relative of his father and a very powerful man. This Raja kept him almost as a prisoner and submitted him to a choice - or he accepted to marry his daughter and assumed Chacval throne at his father's death, or he would geld him and sell him as a slave. So, he decided to flee. "Is the woman you had to marry so ugly?" I asked him, amused, not believing a single word of his story. "I don't know, I only never saw her but veiled, But this is not my problem. I don't want to become a Raja. I want to live my life free and in peace." "And how comes that, if you are a prince, you are so wretchedly dessed?" I asked him, pointing at his humble and worn clothes. The boy had a pitying smile, "To flee from the palace I had to disguise as a servant, of course." "You know, I don't believe a single word of what you told me. Are you not a thief escaping from the guards?" "You can think what you want. You asked me to tell you my story and I told you." The boy said with some pride, trying to stand up, but with a grimace of pain he again fell to the ground. "What's the matter? Where do you feel pain?" I asked. "An ankle. I have possibly sprained it, or possibly even broken it." "Let me see..." His right ankle was indeed visibly swelling. "It isn't broken, earlier I examined you carefully. But for a while you can't walk on it." "Are you a doctor?" "No, but I know about such things." "But I have to run away, to hide. They mustn't catch me." "Neither do I want that, mainly if you risk being gelded. But is that really true? Why you don't tell me the real story? I could even decide to help you..." "I told it! Why don't you want to believe me?" "You can understand that what you told me is a rather preposterous and imaginative story. What proof do you have, to convince me?" "None." "So, you see? That's a pity, because you are a beautiful boy and I like you. But I cannot trust you just because you are beautiful." The boy became silent, his eyes lowered. I then caressed his hair, that he wore long but gathered in a bun over the nape of his neck. It was fine like precious silk. "There is one thing that doesn't persuade me in your story. Why would that Raja geld you if you don't agree to marry and to rule?" "Because he says that, if I refuse, I am not a real man and only real men need to have their genitals." "It is so absurd that it could even be true. But I still don't understand, why do you refuse to rule? How many boys would give one eye to become a king!" "I lived all my childhood to one day become a Raja. I don't like it. A Raja is in reality the slave of the court, of the brahmans and of his women. I don't like it. He has to rule with shrewdness and deception, betraying his friends in order to become more powerful. I don't like it. He has to rule with force and terror to keep his people subjugated. I don't like it. He has to fight wars against the Mohameddan rulers because they embraced a foreign religion, but also against the Hindu ones like him, to become more powerful, and he has to distrust both... And I just do not like it!" "But he lives in luxury and in wealth, he is powerful, honoured, respected." "I don't care." "And what would you like to do, instead?" "A poet errant. Or perhaps also a merchant like you. Or possibly an actor... who knows... But not a Raja! No, not a Raja!" "Listen, I don't know if your story is true or not, but you seem almost convincing. If you want, you can come with me." "To be a merchant?" "Why not? You said you would have liked it, didn't you say so?" "Where are you going?" "First to Peshawar, then to Lahore, and last to Delhi." "You would have to pass close to my father's territory and then through Rawalpindi. I on the contrary want to go far from there." "If they are looking for you, they will not think you are going right there. And then, you could disguise even better than you are, so that they would not recognize you." "You could possibly be right. But disguise me how? The guards could search your caravan and recognize me." "But if you were disguised as a woman... a Mohammeddan woman, veiled... I could tell you are my wife... I don't think they would dare to put their hands on you." The boy looked at me with a weird espression, "You could be right. But... it is not, by chance, that you are just hoping to take me back to gain a reward?" "You want me to believe you, but you don't trust me?" "Anyway, now that I am dismounted and lame, I need your help. So I accept and rely on you." I was now hearing the noise of the caravan that was slowly passing on the road, proceeding down the valley. I told him not to move and went towards my companions to look for help. I called Ibrahim, made him follow me with two horses and some woman's clothes that I had in my merchandise. I had decided to make the boy pass as a woman also in front of the rest of the caravan. I trusted Ibrahim, I knew he would keep the secret, but was afraid that others could betray him, therefore it was better if everybody believed the boy to be a woman. Back to the hiding place, helped by my faithful slave, we undressed Hammira and after tightly bandaging his ankle, we dressed him like a woman, veiling his face. While we were taking off his old clothes and putting the new ones on him, I took profit to touch him several times between his legs. The first time he just reacted with a surprised glance and a slight jerk back, but he said nothing. The second time he again looked at me and when I continued to touch him keeping my eyes fixed on his, he blushed and lowered his eyes, but without moving. The third time I felt he was slightly aroused, his member was palpitating, and I smiled satisfied. So I said in a quiet voice, as if I was talking to myself, "Yes, he will act as my wife. That's a really good idea." "I hope that it would serve to rescue me..." he mumbled without looking at me. I took him on my saddle while Ibrahim followed us on the other horse and we reached the caravan. Soon some curious folk started to ask questions, as I expected. I answered that she was the wife I had bought since a while thanks to a go-between, and that I just went to fetch her. As in those lands it is common to buy a wife, nobody found it weird and Maya, as I decided to call the prince, was accepted by everybody as my wife. Only Rameshi came near me and said, "That woman, Maya you said, is the fugitive and you took profit of that, isn't that so? You can tell me, I'm able to kep the secret..." "You are right, she fled away from the Rawalpindi Raja's harem,where she was a lesser concubine... But she is so beautiful that I decided to help her. I really want to keep her as my wife." Rameshi smiled, nodded and didn't ask me more questions. The squad that was chasing after the prince soon came back but, as they passed us not so long before, they didn't stop to question us, so we peacefully continued our slow journey. At evening we stopped for the last time before going to the city. Ibrahim had a secluded place prepared for me and "my wife", then prepared another for him and the other slaves. After the supper, I withdrew to my sleeping place with Hammira. The boy lokked at me while I was undressing and when I laid near him, he asked, "You want to take me, right?" "Of course Maya, my dear wife. It is natural that a husband lies with his wife, isn't it? Prepare yourself, this will be a night of plesure." The boy, under the blanket wrapping our bodies, freed himself of his clothes and at once started to caress my member that soon stood up, palpitating. He then whispered, "Tell me, merchant, do you like me even though I am a boy?" "Yes, don't you feel it?" "I guessed it when you touched me in that way, there in the woods." "Do you regret that I want you?" I asked him. As an answer he asked me, "Will you put all this sword into me?" "Sure, after you have nicely prepared it with your beautiful and sensuous mouth." "I will make you enjoy it as never before. But don't betray me. Do you promise?" "If you too will keep this promise, I would be crazy to betray you. Good, so, go on, yes, busy yourself..." The youth, who up to then seemed so shy and awkward, ran wild. He really was more than skilled to give pleasure. He was able to stir up fires of passion in me, to give me a paradise of enjoyement. When he perceived that my lust was already bursting, he impaled himself on my shuddering stake, sitting on it, then riding it like a consummate rider, who is going at fast trot, jerking on the saddle. Meanwhile his hands were moving on the most sensitive spots of my body, drawing from them the utmost pleasure. He didn't boast without reason, the beautiful fugitive was fully keeping his promise. And judging from the expression of his face that I barely could see, he too was enjoying the pleasures of paradise. We reached our orgasm in unison, discharging in long and passionate jets, I inside him and he spraying all my body and reaching even my face. Some drops landed also on my lips and on instinct I licked them - they had the taste of rosewater! The boy gently cleaned me then laid on me, still panting. He whispered, "Are you happy with the wife you found for yourself, merchant?" "Yes, you are one of the most exciting boys I ever met. But you... this is certainly not the first time you do such things with a man, you are way too skilled..." "One of the slaves at my father's court, a boy from Cochin China, my private masseur, the son of my father's masseur, taught me the love between men, when I was fifteen and he sixteen... With him I had blazing unions, very beautiful. He taught me how to control orgasms and how to set them off. He taught me what are the most sentive spots of a man's body and how to touch them. "Where you in love with him?" "No, but I felt very good with him, I liked making love with him very much." "Were you ever with a woman?" "Of course. My father gave me some girl slaves as a present, for that purpose. I liked them, but not as much as with my Toung-ci. He was my real garden of delights. I was sad to lose him, when my father sent me to Peshawar. I missed his company, in my long lonely nights." "So, it is that the reason why you did't want to marry? Do you like better men than women?" "It could be also because of that." "And in Peshawar, did you ever had another man?" "No. At that court I was watched all the time. In my whole life, you are the second man who I can make love with. You are not Tuong-chi, but I like you." "More or less than your slave?" "Neither more nor less. You are different. He was a boy like me, you are a man. You are very, very skilled making love, anyway. I really needed it. Thank you." When we joined the caravan again and took the road to the city, Rameshi came near me on his horse and said, "So then, it is not true that you totally disdain a woman's graces, as I thought." "When one finds the right woman, how to disdain her graces?" "And this... wife that you found for yourself, is the right woman?" "Oh yes, I have been lucky. She has fire in her veins, even though she is still so young. And she is skilled. In the king's harem they taught her how to give pleasure to a man." "Hah, lucky you! I am longing to meet my women again!" Rameshi concluded, going away at the light trot." "But, master, didn't Rameshi ever suspect that Hammira was really a boy?" "Neither him nor any other. Only Ibrahim knew it." "And so, you stopped making love with Ibrahim?" "I didn't stop, and at times we also did a threesome." "But is it beautiful making love in group?" "At times. But if you really like much a person, it is a lot better doing it in twos. I mean, sex in threes is good, but love only in twos, do you understand?" "Would you like making it with me and others, all together?" "I really think not, Poletto, And you?" "Oh no! Unless you desired it, master..." "No, my boy. I prefer having you alone, not to share you with anybody else!" "Will you now let me do as the beautiful Hammira did that first time with him?" "You don't have to ask me, you know that; any way you want to make love with me, is always wonderful for me. You know that it is enough I think of you to desire you, to see you to be aroused, to touch you, to want you, to have you, to be happy!" ----------------------------- CONTINUES IN CHAPTER 18 ----------------------------- In my home page I've put some more of my stories. If someone wants to read them, the URL is http://andrejkoymasky.com If you want to send me feed-back, or desire to help revising my English translations, so that I can put on-line more of my stories in English please e-mail at andrej@andrejkoymasky.com ---------------------------